LCA TEJAS VS JF-17: Which Fighter Aircraft is Better ?

LCA TEJAS VS JF-17

LCA TEJAS VS JF-17 :- The HAL Tejas is an Indian single-seat, single-jet engine, multi-role light fighter aircraft designed by the goverment owned Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) for the Indian Air Force and Navy.

India’s Tejas, a Light Combat Aircraft (LCA), that has been inducted into the Indian Air Force often finds itself being compared to Pakistan’s JF-17 Thunder fighter aircraft.

The JF-17 Thunder is a lightweight, single-engine, multi-role combat aircraft developed jointly by the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex (PAC) and the Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC) of China. Tejas, on the other hand is India’s indigenous LCA that has been designed and developed by DRDO, HAL and ADA.

LCA Tejas will be put into combat role by the IAF as mid of 2017 or end of 2017, last year HAL hs handend over two aircraft to the airforce ,and this year hal will handend 4 more aircraft to airforce. with this Indian Air Force will raised the first squadron of tejas – ‘Flying Daggers ’45 . on the other hand, pakistan jf-17 thunder aircaraft was handed over to the Pakistan Airforce in november 2009 .

Pakistan Aeronautical Complex (PAC) says tjhat jf- 17 thunder is a third generation fighter aircraft .on the hand ADA and DRDO claims that LCA TEJAS is a fourth generation plus combat aircraft. Both JF-17 and Tejas are said to have high combat manoeuvrability.

Weapon systems: LCA TEJAS VS JF-17

In terms of weapons, the LCA tejas has 8 hardpoints where the missiles and other weapon systems can be mounted, while the JF-17 thunder has 7 hardpoints. However, the LCA Tejas can carry a much larger variety of Western, Russian, Israeli and Indian weapon systems, as compared to the JF-17 which can handle a limited variety of Chinese and American weapons.

LCA Tejas is designed to carry air-to-air, air-to-surface, precision guided and standoff weaponry. Tejas can carry long-range beyond visual range weapons. According to ADA, Tejas can fire “highly agile high off-boresight missiles” to tackle any close combat threat.

Avionics : LCA TEJAS VS JF-17

One of the most important parameters in modern aerial warfare is avionics. The LCA has better avionics with a hybrid Multi Mode Radar (MMR) developed with Israel. The plane also has an indigenous electronic warfare suite known as Mayavi (illusionist). The targeting pod on the LCA Tejas is also the superior Litening unit, as compared to the FLIR used on the JF-17.

Going forward, even the JF-17 will get a more modern suite of electronics and other improvements when it gets upgraded to the Block 2 variant. However, roughly by that time, HAL would also have upgraded the Tejas to its Mark-2 version, which would have a significant lead over the JF-17 in almost all parameters.Let’s compare the two aircraft LCA TEJAS VS JF-17 specs wise and see which of the two wins on paper:

Pakistan’s JF-17 thunder has a higher thrust to weight ratio, a higher service ceiling and higher range. Except for these advantages, the LCA Tejas is superior in every other parameter. The HAL Tejas has a higher maximum take-off weight and its carbon composite airframe is far superior to the metallic JF-17 airframe.Why compare in the first place?

Defence and aviation experts says saveral times that any comparison between the two aircraft is not right.

Ravi Gupta, a former scientist with DRDO says that there is a generation gap between HAL LCA Tejas and pakistan JF-17. “JF-17 thunder is an upgraded version of MiG-21, developed by China for Pakistan. Tejas makes use of composite materials, while JF-17 is all metal. Tejas is far far superior in terms of avionics and manoeuvrability. HAL Tejas also boasts of a glass cockpit where data is available to the pilot in real-time digital format,”

“The induction of LCA Tejas is a proud moment for India and Indian airforce .Increasingly Indian defence players will compete to be a part of the Tejas supply chain. It is also a big leg up for the entire supply chain that has been established around HALTejas. ” “As far as the JF-17 is concerned, there is no comparison of Tejas with that Chinese aircraft. Tejas is in a class of its own,” Says Colonel KV Kuber, Independent Consultant Defence and Aerospace